The explosive growth of the Internet as a publication and interactive communication platform has seen parallel growth in the volume of resources and materials that may be accessed by the Internet. To enable users to navigate this unprecedented volume of information, a number of so-called “search engine” technologies have been developed and deployed under various brands. Widely deployed search engine technologies have been developed by Alta Vista, Inc., Inktomi, Inc., and Google, Incorporated. Internet search-engine features have been critical to the number of the major portals (e.g., Yahoo!, Incorporated and Excite) in attracting users to such portals.
Search engine technology is also widely deployed within the context of web sites, so as to allow visitors to a particular web site to locate documents or features that may be of interest. For example, a large number of corporate web sites that operate as major communication channels to customers typically employ search engine technology to allow a user to, for example, locate technical documents and articles pertaining to specific products.
The use of search engine technology is also widely evident in internet-based electronic marketplaces or exchanges. Currently, such marketplaces are classified as being business-to-consumer (B2C), consumer-to-consumer (C2C), or business-to-business (B2B) according to the types of parties between which they facilitate transactions. In the context of a B2B exchange, a purchaser for a particular company may, via the online exchange, conduct a search of the inventories of suppliers, these inventories having been published by the relevant suppliers to the online exchange. Similarly, in the B2C and the C2C environments, a potential purchaser is enabled to search product offerings by multiple suppliers utilizing search engine technology employed by the relevant marketplace. One form of an electronic marketplace that has proved to be popular is the consumer-oriented online auction marketplace, where suppliers publish product or service offerings to be sold via an auction process. The publication of classified advertisements (e.g., via Yahoo! Classifieds) may also be classified as publishing to an online marketplace, where transactions are established.
The value of a search-engine technology within the context of such online marketplaces is particularly evident when one considers the number of products or services that are being offered by suppliers via such marketplaces. For example, on the popular online-auction facility developed and operated by Ebay, Incorporated of San Jose Calif., at any one time there may be between two and four million items or services available for receiving bids.
In order to bring a degree of automation to searching of the vast and ever-dynamic inventory available for purchase on an online marketplace, a number of such online marketplaces offer automated search features. Such automated search features typically allow the user to define search terms and conditions. The online marketplace will then, at scheduled times, automatically conduct a search utilizing the terms and conditions, and automatically communicate the results of these searches to the relevant user. In this way, the user can automatically be advised when items of interest to this user become available for purchase via the online marketplace.
Regardless of the context or environment within which an Internet-based search occurs, the results typically take the form of a list of hypertext (or linked) titles or descriptions presented in the context of a markup language document (e.g., HyperText Markup Language (HTML) document). To view further details regarding a particular “search hit”, a user selects the hypertext title, responsive to which a resource to which the title is linked is invoked (e.g., a further HTML page may be displayed).
It often occurs that only a small percentage of a search result set is in fact of interest to the user.